Date: Fri 15-Nov-1996

Publication: Bee

Author: SHANNO

Illustration: C

Location: A13

Quick Words:

Rush-concert-Lee-Peart-Lifeson

Full Text:

(rev Rush concert @Hartford Civic Center, 11/15/96)

Concert Review-

Back To Basics: A Welcome Return By Rush

(with photo)

BY SHANNON HICKS

HARTFORD - Name a song, and they probably played it.

When Geddy Lee announced early into the Rush concert Sunday night at the Civic

Center that the band had about 30 to 40 songs to perform for its wide

age-ranging audience, he wasn't kidding. Three hours later, one of the best

tours the trio has done in recent memory became, as the Smithereens say, "only

a memory."

Vocalist and bass player Geddy Lee, guitarist (acoustic and electric, not to

mention the mandola) Alex Lifeson, and percussionist Neil Peart - who bears a

frighteningly strong resemblance to Fred Schneider of the B-52s these days -

took a break from the band and each other following the final show in 1994 of

the Counterparts tour, a tour considered by many a close repeat of the band's

previous tour.

The time, Peart has said, was the trio's way of taking a break from "being a

genius together." Lee and his wife had a daughter; Lifeson produced a solo

album; and Peart produced a tribute to the Big Band music of Buddy Rich. By

October 1995 it was time to get back to work, however, and the result is the

album the band is touring behind these days: Test For Echo .

The album, and its current tour, is a welcome return to the Rush days of yore.

For two tours, the band was depending too much on special effects -

synthesizers, specifically; video images, secondly - that took too much

attention away from the music everyone knew the band could come out with.

The Rush of the late 1980s/early 1990s was not the Rush the world fell in love

with during the late 1970s/early 1980s. The band that churned out pop fluff

like "We Are Young" and "Big Money" was not the same band that came up with

the brilliance of "Tom Sawyer," "Limelight" or "2112" in its formative years -

the latter of which was played in its entirety Sunday night, which thrilled

the house to no end.

As did the rest of the show at the Civic Center last Sunday. The stage was an

interesting mix of ice cream shop paraphernalia - a milk shake machine, a

blender, napkin and straw dispensers, an old-fashioned icebox - with a

life-size cut-out of The Three Stooges hiding behind the icebox, and a pair of

radio (??) antennas flanking either side of the stage. A full-size movie/video

screen, as in the last few tours, was still behind the band, but this time it

did not try to be the center of attention.

This tour centers around the music, as it should be. It commands center stage

from the moment Lee, Lifeson and Peart took the stage. A few recent songs were

performed - with Lifeson wasting no time getting into some guitar wizardry,

even walking to center stage a few times as if his brilliant playing didn't

already pull the spotlight toward him - before the trio launched into "Driven"

and "Half the World," back-to-back cuts from Testing For Echo .

The new album and tour go back to the basics for Rush. It was about time.

Sunday night the band took their time - and that of their fans - and used it

wisely.